After we got back from our trek that night both of us were pooped! It wasn’t even a strenuous hike, we were just out of shape and not used to sweating that much. Joey and I wanted to get a good night’s sleep before our early morning bus ride to Medan to catch our flight. That night the people in the room above us for incredibly inconsiderate and loud! Stomping around, laughing loudly and talking/yelling. This started at 11pm when we had just fallen asleep. It went on until about 1:30am. We finally got some decent sleep but were woken up at 4am to the guy upstairs getting ready for work/prayer (I’m not sure). Joey had repeatedly banged on the roof and told them to shut up. At this point, I don’t think it’s impolite.
Our alarm went off at 5am and we dragged ourselves out of bed. We had quite a hike to the bus station and we wanted to be out of Bukit Lawang on the 7am bus. Eventually we found our way to the bus station and pretty much left on the bus as soon as we got there. This is not a common occurrence in Indonesia. Generally the buses wait until the bus is packed, regardless if it was supposed to leave an hour ago. In exchange for a timely bus, we were surrounded by screaming children and techno on the speakers. None of us was going to get the sleep we were depending on! That’s transport for you in Indonesia!
When we finally made it to the airport we found out that our reservations for our flight were cancelled. We couldn’t buy tickets on Batavia’s website because they don’t accept any credit cards that aren’t Indonesian, Malaysian or Singaporean. Joey got one of the girls at our hotel in Danau Toba to make our reservation because the people at the call centre had horrendous English. Despite our tickets being cancelled, we were able to book another ticket anyway. It actually worked out to be better because the tickets were cheaper than originally quoted on the phone.
Around the airport there were lots of warungs (Indonesian word for restaurant/foodstall). Both Joey and I had not had breakfast so we were starving. We chose one place that had an English menu, but unfortunately no one spoke English. We were surprised considering we were at an airport. I ordered nasi goreng (fried rice) but it never came because apparently the server didn’t know I ordered? Now emanciated, we walked to another warung, where no one else spoke English again. I took out our guidebook and attempted to order water and fried rice without meat. I was laughed at. At this point I burst into tears because I was so tired and hungry; I really just didn’t feel like being laughed at. The server probably had no idea what was going on. I felt bad for the guy, but honestly if someone is trying to speak your language don’t laugh at them! It doesn’t make them want to try even if it wasn’t malicious laughter!
Our flight was rather uneventful. We got to Yogykarta just in time to see the sunset. It was just as hot in Yogya as it was in Medan. We went to the common backpacker area and a guy helped us find a place (either because he got commission or because he wanted us to look at his paintings after). I get that Yogykarta is very cultural, but the locals really ruin it by constantly asking to show you their batik or to take you to their friend's batik store. It's even funnier when they try to convince you it's easy to pack around a huge canvas painting when you're backpacking for another 2 months!
The next day we walked around our area of town, but didn't really care to see much because we were in trip planning mode. We needed to know when we would be arriving in Sipadan (an amazing diving place that is heavily protected and only 100 people are allowed to dive a day so things get booked up fast), and also where we wanting to spend the rest of our time in Indonesia. We knew we didn't want to go to Borobodur which is a buddhist temple just outside the temple. Trust me, we've seen enough buddhist temples for a life time. I'm still not even convinced if you say it is as spectacular as Angkor Wat (which I'm sure it isn't). So we only stayed in Yogykarta one full day and two nights.
We booked a 3 day tour that took us to Gunung Bromo (a volcano) and Ijen (a crater filled with a hotspring lake) and then to the ferries where we would go on our way to Bali. It was quite cheap because we mentioned that our friends had told us about it. Only 500,000. We know a lot of other people paid quite a bit more!
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